Jigsaw 15, Series 3

Christmas saw the arrival of a shiny new jigsaw from Ravensburger: 500 sturdy pieces, a pleasure to hold and handle, equipped with the last Softclick technology.

As is traditional, started with the border. The card table was nowhere near big enough to hold both pieces and puzzle, so a drawing board was recruited for the latter. Aloe and orchids to the right, feet below.

A regular puzzle, which is what I like, with four pieces meeting at every interior vertex. In essentials, a rectangular grid, much like an Excel worksheet.

However, by the second day it was apparent that this drawing board was not big enough. We had a big puzzle and needed to upgrade to the big drawing board, where the border and the internal framework were completed in fairly short order. And by close, the central section was largely complete.

By mid afternoon of the third day, Thursday, the central section was complete, all four quadrants had been started and two of them were well on the way. The technique of selecting pieces from the heap by colour worked well for this particular puzzle, first red then yellow.

By close, we had got to a position where every remaining piece had to lock on somewhere. That is to say, very close to home. With BH reminding me that doing a jigsaw taken from a painting painted for the purpose was far easier, and in many ways more satisfying, than doing a jigsaw taken from a photograph, apt to be far more of a slog.

BH pushed the last piece into place on Friday afternoon. Christmas festivities drawn to a close. All that remains is the dismantling of the Christmas tree.

The box. Plus our latest kitchen timer. Not much good for short times, but good for bread.

PS: the small drawing board was decorated many years ago with a view to be used as an arty backgammon board. In the event, I did not get the board quite right and at about the same time our not very strong urge to play backgammon faded away again. A game which the naval uncle and aunt used to play a good deal, but it never really caught on with us.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/04/jigsaw-14-series-3.html.

Reference 2: https://www.ravensburger.co.uk/en-GB/products/jigsaw-puzzles. 

Group search key: jigsawsk.